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Tears stain Dorian's cheeks as his lover's blood has his hands. It only hurts this much right now, right? How could he have been so blinded by the madness that Dorian couldn't tell it was his lover he was stabbing? His heart aches, and realization sets in. Dorian has lost his soulmate. Sobs echo throughout the caverns of the Starless Sea, carried for miles by the water which surrounds him and his lover who lay on the ground in front of him, impaled by his sword. His maroon blood seeps into the waves that crash around them, turning the pale green water to dark pink. “I’ll be getting over you my whole life, Zachary Ezra Rawlins” Dorian whispers, voice cracking.
Somebody once told Dorian “We're all just stardust and stories”. Dorian cannot remember who. Perhaps it was Mirabel, or maybe a pedestrian in Central Park, or a woman in a library. No matter who it was, the words have stuck in Dorian's mind like a stain on a satin blouse since the moment it left their lips. Twinkling in the back of his mind like an embarrassing memory or a task he's been putting off. Always there, waiting, but for what? After the shock dissipates from his mind, turning sour like old milk, the words tiptoe in. Stardust and Stories. Zachary and Dorian. So Dorian begins to write, writing to work through the grief, the guilt, and the yearning for his lover, now lost to the waves of the Starless Sea.
This is the story of Dorian and Zachary.
Stage One: Shock
Shock rattles through me like an earthquake. What have I done? My hands tremble. Zachary, my lover, dead by my sword. What do I do? The water of the Starless Sea is rising. I cannot take Zachary if I want to try to get out of here. I place his cold body on a nearby piece of wood, making the shape of a flower on his chest from stones not yet bloodstained before letting the waves take him out to sea. Tears flow from my eyes as I watch the water until I can no longer see my Zachary. I start the adventure out of the Starless Sea, if it's even possible. There is a heaviness in my chest that won't go away. A weight under my skin, as if Zachary was trying to keep me with him. It pains me to leave him so soon. We were just reunited, only to be separated again…
Stage Two: Denial
Reminders of Zachary are everywhere.
He is in the waters of the Starless Sea where I let the waves wash my lover away, with his hand over his heart, looking as though he was merely taking a nap. I so wished he was. That he would wake up and this nightmare would be over, and that he could hear his voice again, feel his warm touch on my skin instead of the cold chill I felt when he lay his lover to rest.
Zachary is in what scraps were salvaged from the painting of the two of us, once done by an old friend. His warm eyes and tan skin vibrant against the fraying edges of the canvas.
Zachary is in the streets of New York City. He is in the coffee shops on every corner, and the flowers in central park. There are fragments of him in everyone, I find. Every once in a while, My mind will trick me, and I will do a double take at a stranger, a small piece of my mind still convinced that I will find my lover's eyes meeting mine, not the judgemental grimace of a stressed out lawyer on their way to the subway station after a long day.
Despite knowing the truth, for months I still believed Zachary was alive. Maybe it was foolish hope, or just denial to soothe myself and work through the grief, but my heart yearns for my lover. What if he survived? That I didn't kill him, but madness made me believe that I did? What if Zachary wasn't there in the first place? That he escaped the Harbor and is living somewhere else, happy and healthy? I know it isn't true, but I still hold out hope, but at what point does hope become cynicism? Blind hope to make myself feel better, so I can try to forget what I did to my beloved Zachary.
Stage Three: Anger & Bargaining
Zachary is everywhere, but also not. He is in everything, but nothing, except the aggressive waves of the Starless Sea, thousands of miles beneath this city, to never be seen again by anyone. There is no grave to remember mark his life, spare for a sign that his mother has put in her shop window.
Zachary's mother. Madame Love Rawlins. I cannot bring myself to go visit her. I haven't since the day I told her. I watched her as her heart broke in two. Her voice quivered as her hands started to shake, and tears began to pour out of her eyes. Her only son, lost to time. What happened? How did he pass? Did it seem painful? I didn't have the heart to tell her it was me. The man sitting in front of her right now. The man whose hands are holding her own are the same ones that held the sword. That ended his life with one foul stab. I killed her son. The son I was in love with. Am, in love with.
To say I have regretted the action every day since then would be an understatement. I am haunted by it every waking moment, as if Zachary’s ghost has been following me, sucking the happiness out of everything as a form of punishment. I've cried and screamed and mutilated myself as a way to repent. Praying to any god that will listen to make the silky blood spilling from my arms somehow find a way to refill Zachary’s empty veins, to make his heart beat once again. Take my life and give Zachary back. Give him back to his mother, to Kat, to the people that miss him even more than I love him. Zachary was home personified, he was all that is sweet and happy. Give him back to the world, and take me as a trade. He would find much better than me, while I will spend my entire life loving the man whose precious life I ended.
Stage Four: Depression
Zachary was everything that is good in the world, and ever since he passed, it seems that everything worth living for has faded from my mind. My eyes are dry and my bones are tired. My soul is empty. Should I just end everything? No one will miss me the way they miss him. The weeks pass in a blur. I've been telling Madame Rawlins I will visit soon but I cannot bring myself to see her. To look at her in the eyes and pretend that I don't see Zachary looking back at me. Time blends together, the seasons change, and holidays come and go. What is the point of life without love? What is the point of continuing life when you don't see the light at the end of the tunnel? I should jus
It's been two days since I wrote that last paragraph, I cannot remember what I was in the middle of writing when Madame Rawlins showed up and took me out to lunch. We talked about life, about her shop, and eventually Zachary, but not the end of his life. His childhood, his interests, his past relationships, and how “none of them compare to you” Then she went on about how much she loves me, and how she can tell I loved Zachary. That made me smile because I truly do love him so much. It's funny how some people love unconditionally. Madame Rawlins is one of those people. Zachary was one of those people.
Stage Five: Acceptance and Hope
Walking past the tiger statues Patience & Fortitude outside of the New York Public Library, I am reminded of the first time Zachary and I properly met. How his skin sparkled with snowflakes in the January lamplight. It's been nearly 6 years since then, yet it feels like yesterday. I can still recall the butterflies I got in my stomach upon seeing him for the first time at the masquerade. All I could see was his eyes and his hair, but oh how he was beautiful. So full of love, and hope. A smile brighter than the sun. I never told him how much I loved him, but I truly do think he was made for me, the way the Mona Lisa was made to be seen by art lovers, except nobody will love Zachary Ezra Rawlins as much as I do.
If humans were stars in the sky, Zachary was the whole universe, and the universe was made just to be seen by my eyes.